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E-Participation: a Quick Overview of Recent Qualitative Trends

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E-Participation: a Quick Overview of Recent Qualitative Trends DESA Working Paper No. 163 ST/ESA/2020/DWP/163 JANUARY 2020 E-participation: a quick overview of recent qualitative trends Author: David Le Blanc ABSTRACT This paper briefly takes stock of two decades of e-participation initiatives based on a limited review of the academic literature. The purpose of the paper is to complement the results of the e-government Survey 2020. As such, the emphasis is on aspects that the e-government survey (based on analysis of e-government portals and on quantitative indicators) does not capture directly. Among those are the challenges faced by e-participation initiatives and key areas of attention for governments. The paper maps the field of e-par- ticipation and related activities, as well as its relationships with other governance concepts. Areas of recent development in terms of e-participation applications are briefly reviewed. The paper selectively highlights conclusions from the literature on different participation tools, as well as a list of key problematic areas for policy makers. The paper concludes that while e-participation platforms using new technologies have spread rapidly in developed countries in the first decade of the 2000s and in developing countries during the last 10 years, it is not clear that their multiplication has translated into broader or deeper citizen participation. Be- yond reasons related to technology access and digital skills, factors such as lack of understanding of citizens’ motivations to participate and the reluctance of public institutions to genuinely share agenda setting and decision-making power seem to play an important role in the observed limited progress. JEL Classification: D73, D78, O17 Keywords: E-participation; e-government; sustainable development goals. Sustainable Development Goals: 16, 16.6, 16.7 Disclaimer: The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations. Acknowledgements: I thank Qianxin Li for research assistance on this paper, and an anonymous reviewer for useful com- ments. Please send your comments to D. Le Blanc, at [email protected]. CONTENTS I Introduction . 3 II Defining e-participation . 4 III Recent qualitative trends at the global level . 10 IV Challenges to e-participation: Main areas for the attention of policy-makers . 16 V Conclusion . 26 References . .. 28 UN/DESA Working Papers are preliminary documents circulated in a limited number of copies and posted on the DESA website at https://www.un.org/development/desa/ publications/working-paper to stimulate discussion and critical comment. The views and opinions expressed here- in are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect UNITED NATIONS those of the United Nations Secretariat. The designations Department of Economic and Social Affairs and terminology employed may not conform to United UN Secretariat, 405 East 42nd Street Nations practice and do not imply the expression of any New York, N.Y. 10017, USA opinion whatsoever on the part of the Organization. e-mail: [email protected] Typesetter: Nancy Settecasi https://www.un.org/development/desa/ E-PARTICIPATION: A QUICK OVERVIEW OF RECENT QUALITATIVE TRENDS I Introduction E-participation has become a common instrument used by governments across the world as part of their e-government toolbox. This paper was prepared as a background paper for the chapter on e-participation of the 2020 edition of the United Nations e-government Survey. The e-government Survey, published every two years, provides an overview of recent developments in e-government at the national level, based on data col- lected from national e-government portals (see Box 1). This paper aims to complement the Survey’s approach by reviewing recent qualitative trends and challenges in terms of e-participation, based on a review of recent literature. The ambition here is not to cover in detail all developments in the field of e-participation – this would require an exhaustive report1 and would face severe constraints in terms of data availability. Rather, the paper is intended as a kind of primer on e-participation for people who would like to have some background when they read global publications on e-government such as the UN e-government survey. As such, the emphasis is on aspects that the e-government Survey does not capture directly. The paper maps the field of e-participation and related activities, as well as its relationships with other governance concepts. Areas of recent development in terms of e-participation applications are briefly reviewed. The paper provides a quick overview of selected salient issues in e-participation for policy makers, without entering into details. In all the paper, the objective is to flag important points or reference frameworks, not to elaborate on them or to provide new theoretical or empirical evidence. The arguments made in the paper are based on a partial review of the literature. An initial set of references was obtained by searching the Scopus database based on keywords.2 Additional references were obtained by Box 1 Scope of the United Nations E-government Survey Since 2003, the United Nations E-government Survey has tracked developments in e-government in all countries . The Survey is a well-recognized global source of data on e-government . The methodology of the Survey is based on inspection of national government portals . It therefore focuses on the provision by government of electronic services, information, and opportunities for consultation and engagement on policy-making and service delivery, at the national (whole-of-government and sectoral) level . Due to this methodology, the e-government Survey essentially provides information on the “supply-side” of e-participation and does not measure the “demand side” for participation . It does not either focus on the “e-democracy” aspect of e-participation, i .e . initiatives that aim to involve citizens in the construction of the political discourse . Lastly, the Survey does not yet systematically cover the sub-national level, where a large portion of the innovations in terms of e-participation have come from . The Survey . does not assess the take-up and use of e-participation participation opportunities by citizens and the quality of the resulting participation . It does not measure outcomes of e-participation – primary outcomes of interest would include the difference made in the quality of policies and decisions made, and improvements in the quality of public services . Similarly, the Survey does not measure the costs and bene- fits of e-participation . Source: Author's elaboration. 1 For example, see a recent publication covering e-participation (among other aspects of e-democracy) at the European level, Hennen et al., 2019. The report is 350 pages long. 2 The keywords used were based on prior reviews of the field, including: Macintosh (2004); Saebø et al. (2008); and Medaglia (2012). 3 DESA WORKING PAPER NO. 163 scanning the bibliography of the papers thus collected. In total, about 150 articles were read by the author. Only a subset of those - those found most relevant or compelling by the author - are mentioned here. The remainder of the paper is constructed as follows. The next section covers definitional issues and locates e-participation with respect to other governance-related concepts with which it interacts. Section 3 surveys recent qualitative trends in terms of channels, mechanisms and tools for e-participation. Section 4 presents key challenges that require the attention of governments. Section 5 concludes. II Defining E-participation II.1 Definition Definitions of e-participation found in the academic and practitioner literature vary, but most of them re- volve around the basic concept of using information and communication technologies (ICTs) to engage cit- izen in decision-making and public service delivery (Macintosh, 2004; Saebø et al., 2008, Medaglia, 2012). E-participation is more rarely defined as a branch of e-government with special focus on citizen engagement for deliberation and decision orientation (Welch, 2012). The definition used by the UN is “the process of engaging citizens through ICTs in policy, decision-making, and service design and delivery so as to make it participatory, inclusive and deliberative” (UN, 2014). Saebø, Rose and Flak (2008) define e-participation as a social activity, mediated by ICT, involving interaction between citizens, public administration and politicians. This definition highlights the key importance of the triangle citizens – public administration – politicians as actors in e-participation initiatives, and therefore as key stakeholders to consider when looking at the success and impact of such initiatives. In all these definitions, government has a role to play. That is to say, e-participation usually does not cover civic initiatives or political discussions that take place without the involvement of the government as initiator, moderator, or receiver. Given the increasing presence of such initiatives in recent years, the question of their articulation with formal institutional processes has been a key subject of attention (see section 3 below). This paper focuses on participatory mechanisms in which the government plays a role. II.2 Rationales for e-participation As a sub-field of participation, e-participation is seen as necessary both for intrinsic reasons and for instru- mental reasons. Intrinsic reasons are based on the idea that participation (online or offline) is a desirable goal, which contributes to inclusive societies
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